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		<header>
			<h1>The Book of Mormon</h1>
			<p>An account written by the hand of Mormon, upon plates taken from the plates of Nephi.</p>
		</header>
<p>
	Wikisource seems to think the <a href="https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Book_of_Mormon_%281981%29">1981 edition of the Book of Mormon</a> is in the public domain on account of being published before 1924.
	Read that over for a bit.
	Yeah, that doesn&apos;t make any sense to me, either.
	The copy on Wikisource seems to lack some of the material that was added in the 1981 edition though, and even the chapter summaries from the 1920 edition, so it&apos;s likely that the only text included is in fact that old.
	That begs the question of why it&apos;s labelled as the 1981 edition though; the 1920 addition had the chapter and verse numbers, so it&apos;s not that.
	In any case, I trust Wikisource knows what they&apos;re talking about, so I&apos;ll be quoting passages from that version of the Book of Mormon.
	It is also my understanding that the only changes this edition made to the verses were to <a href="https://emp.byui.edu/SATTERFIELDB/Papers/BMPublicationHistory.htm">correct errors in the copy given to the printer</a>, meaning that this version of the verses likely existed at the time of the 1920 edition, but the copy given to the printer just wasn&apos;t quite right.
	I do not intend to commit copyright infringement.
	If you know this version of the verses to be in fact copyrighted, please let me know and I will make the adjustments (that is, I&apos;ll find the corresponding verse in an older version and use that instead).
	I don&apos;t know how to track down information on the copyrights, and I couldn&apos;t find the 1920 edition of the book that I intended to use.
</p>
<p>
	Anyway, without further ado ...
</p>
<nav>
	<ul>
		<li>
			<a href="#inconsistency">Inconsistency between the holy word and the beliefs</a>
		</li>
		<li>
			<a href="#Jehovah">Jehovah&apos;s name</a>
		</li>
		<li>
			<a href="#witnesses">The witnesses</a>
		</li>
		<li>
			<a href="#conceited">Conceited</a>
		</li>
		<li>
			<a href="#possible">Is it possible to follow his orders?</a>
		</li>
		<li>
			<a href="#straw_man">Straw man</a>
		</li>
		<li>
			<a href="#offerings">Offerings</a>
		</li>
		<li>
			<a href="#plates">Various plates</a>
		</li>
		<li>
			<a href="#inbreeding">Inbreeding</a>
		</li>
		<li>
			<a href="#virginity">Visible virginity?</a>
		</li>
		<li>
			<a href="#redemption">Redemption</a>
		</li>
		<li>
			<a href="#hell">Hell</a>
		</li>
		<li>
			<a href="#blame">Passing blame</a>
		</li>
		<li>
			<a href="#logic">Bad logic</a>
		</li>
		<li>
			<a href="#inheritance">Inheritance of blame</a>
		</li>
		<li>
			<a href="#procreation">Procreation</a>
		</li>
		<li>
			<a href="#racism">Racism</a>
		</li>
		<li>
			<a href="#one">One entity</a>
		</li>
		<li>
			<a href="#versus">Us-versus-them mentality</a>
		</li>
		<li>
			<a href="#purification">Purification</a>
		</li>
		<li>
			<a href="#diet">Effects of diet on morality</a>
		</li>
		<li>
			<a href="#signs">Signs</a>
		</li>
		<li>
			<a href="#ghost">Holy Ghost</a>
		</li>
		<li>
			<a href="#poligamy">Poligamy</a>
		</li>
		<li>
			<a href="#limitations">Limitations of Jehovah</a>
		</li>
		<li>
			<a href="#anything">Ask for anything you want</a>
		</li>
		<li>
			<a href="#life">Debt for life</a>
		</li>
	</ul>
</nav><section id="inconsistency">
	<h2>Inconsistency between the holy word and the beliefs</h2>
	<p>
		Some of what the Mormons believe directly contradicts what their holy book actually tells them.
		I&apos;m not sure where they&apos;re getting information on what to believe if not the holy book, and if their other source is somehow better, and clearly contradicts the book, why do they put any faith in the book at all? If the book isn&apos;t reliable, it isn&apos;t reliable.
	</p>
	<p>
		Examples of this will be in their own sections.
		A couple of these inconsistencies are brought up in <a href="#possible">#possible</a> and <a href="#hell">#hell</a>.
	</p>
</section>
<section id="Jehovah">
	<h2>Jehovah&apos;s name</h2>
	<p>
		Many Christians don&apos;t even know their god has a name.
		They think he&apos;s just called &quot;god&quot;.
		That&apos;s like when you have a cat and you sometimes call it &quot;cat&quot; instead of its actual name.
		It&apos;s fine to do that, but &quot;cat&quot; was never its name.
		The same goes for the Christian god.
	</p>
	<p>
		The Christian god has many names, the two most common being Yahweh and Jehovah.
		In the Book of Mormon, the Christian god usually isn&apos;t mentioned by name, but finally, we learn his name in the second book of Nephi:
	</p>
	<div class="cited-quotation">
		<cite>2 Nephi 22:2</cite>
		<blockquote>
			<p>
				Behold, God is my salvation; I will trust, and not be afraid; for the Lord JEHOVAH is my strength and my song; he also has become my salvation. 
			</p>
		</blockquote>
	</div>
	<p>
		With that in mind, seeing as I tend to call people by their actual names (except in my journal, where I leave out the names for the privacy of the people in my life), I&apos;ll frequently make mention of Jehovah by that name throughout the rest of this page.
		I only bring this up for people that don&apos;t actually know the name Jehovah, so you&apos;ll know who I&apos;m even talking about.
	</p>
</section>
<section id="witnesses">
	<h2>The witnesses</h2>
	<p>
		There were supposedly eleven witnesses to the existence of the golden plates, aside from Joseph Smith himself - the author of the Book of Mormon and supposed translator of said plates.
		If you were to start up a religion, or even an offshoot of a religion, you too would gather witnesses to make your religion seem valid.
		You might bribe these witnesses with any number of things, such as seats of power within your church.
		Claiming there are witnesses, and those witnesses bearing testimony, doesn&apos;t say much when you&apos;re hiding the evidence from the rest of the world.
		By not producing the plates for the world to see, Smith made it very difficult to believe such plates ever existed.
	</p>
	<p>
		It&apos;s also worth noting that five of these witnesses are from the Whitmer family and three are from Joseph Smiths&apos;s own family.
		One is even Smith&apos;s father.
		His own family is going to be biased, obviously, and the number of Whitmers makes me wonder if the Whitmer family and the Smith family have close ties as well.
		Aside from people from these two families, there are only three other supposed witnesses.
	</p>
	<p>
		An interesting excuse for being unable to produce the plates that were &quot;translated&quot; is presented in the book:
	</p>
	<div class="cited-quotation">
		<cite>2 Nephi 27:22</cite>
		<blockquote>
			<p>
				Wherefore, when thou hast read the words which I have commanded thee, and obtained the witnesses which I have promised unto thee, then shalt thou seal up the book again, and hide it up unto me, that I may preserve the words which thou hast not read, until I shall see fit in mine own wisdom to reveal all things unto the children of men.
			</p>
		</blockquote>
	</div>
	<p>
		Basically, the plate contain more than the Book of Mormon, but Jehovah wants to withhold the rest from us for now.
		The claim, obviously, is that the plates can&apos;t be shown to people because they might read more from them than they&apos;re supposed to.
		It leaves an interesting loophole to allow Smith to add more scriptures if he wants to later, too.
		Mostly though, it seems to just be an excuse as to why these alleged plates cannot be produced.
	</p>
</section>
<section id="conceited">
	<h2>Conceited</h2>
	<p>
		We see throughout the book that Jahovah is quite conceited.
		For our first example, take a look as early as 1 Nephi 1:8.
	</p>
	<div class="cited-quotation">
		<cite>1 Nephi 1:8</cite>
		<blockquote>
			<p>
				And being thus overcome with the Spirit, he was carried away in a vision, even that he saw the heavens open, and he thought he saw God sitting upon his throne, surrounded with numberless concourses of angels in the attitude of singing and praising their God. 
			</p>
		</blockquote>
	</div>
	<p>
		Jehovah has some of his angels surrounding him just singing his praise.
		Seriously?
		If you were some great and powerful being, would you need someone there bolstering your ego, or would you just know how great you were?
		The missionaries I spoke with tell me they think Jehovah didn&apos;t tell the angels to do that, but instead, they just do that out of gratitude for all he&apos;s done for them and us.
		But again, if you&apos;re not highly egotistical, that sort of thing is going to get really old, really fast.
		If he wasn&apos;t egotistical, he&apos;d probably tell them to knock it off.
		Also, if the angels weren&apos;t either mindless drones or under orders, singing praises is going to get old for them too.
		They&apos;re going to want to stop.
		But no.
		He doesn&apos;t want them to stop.
		He actually wants <strong>*more*</strong> praise.
		He wants a land full of only people that praise him:
	</p>
	<div class="cited-quotation">
		<cite>2 Nephi 10:19</cite>
		<blockquote>
			<p>
				Wherefore, I will consecrate this land unto thy seed, and them who shall be numbered among thy seed, forever, for the land of their inheritance; for it is a choice land, saith God unto me, above all other lands, wherefore I will have all men that dwell thereon that they shall worship me, saith God.
			</p>
		</blockquote>
	</div>
	<p>
		Here, we&apos;re shown that Jehova wants us to glorify him forever:
	</p>
	<div class="cited-quotation">
		<cite>Jacob 2:21</cite>
		<p>
			Do ye not suppose that such things are abominable unto him who created all flesh?
			And the one being is as precious in his sight as the other.
			And all flesh is of the dust; and for the selfsame end hath he created them, that they should keep his commandments and glorify him forever.
		</p>
	</div>
</section>
<section id="possible">
	<h2>Is it possible to follow his orders?</h2>
	<p>
		This is what Nephi had to say about the ability to follow commandments given by Jehovah:
	</p>
	<div class="cited-quotation">
		<cite>1 Nephi 3:7</cite>
		<blockquote>
			<p>
				And it came to pass that I, Nephi, said unto my father:
				I will go and do the things which the Lord hath commanded, for I know that the Lord giveth no commandments unto the children of men, save he shall prepare a way for them that they may accomplish the thing which he commandeth them.
			</p>
		</blockquote>
	</div>
	<p>
		Put simply, if Jehovah commands you to do something, he&apos;s first cleared the path to the goal enough that following his order is possible.
		I&apos;m not saying it&apos;s necessarily <strong>*easy*</strong>, but if he tells you to do it, you can do it.
		And another example:
	</p>
	<div class="cited-quotation">
		<cite>1 Nephi 17:50</cite>
		<blockquote>
			<p>
				And I said unto them:
				If God had commanded me to do all things I could do them.
				If he should command me that I should say unto this water, be thou earth, it should be earth; and if I should say it, it would be done.
			</p>
		</blockquote>
	</div>
	<p>
		No mater what Jehovah tells you to do, if he tells you to do it, you can definitely do it.
		No exceptions.
	</p>
	<p>
		Compare that to the Mormon belief that Adam and Eve were given conflicting commandments.
		They were told both to reproduce and to not eat the forbidden fruit.
		The Mormons believe that Adam and Eve were unable to learn how to reproduce without eating the fruit, so the only way they could follow part of their orders was to disobey the other part.
		The Mormons believe Adam and Eve were unable to follow their orders completely, and had to choose which part of the instructions they were going to break.
	</p>
	<p>
		And here, we see that general theme again:
	</p>
	<div class="cited-quotation">
		<cite>1 Nephi 17:3</cite>
		<blockquote>
			<p>
				And thus we see that the commandments of God must be fulfilled.
				And if it so be that the children of men keep the commandments of God he doth nourish them, and strengthen them, and provide means whereby they can accomplish the thing which he has commanded them; wherefore, he did provide means for us while we did sojourn in the wilderness. 
			</p>
		</blockquote>
	</div>
	<p>
		This time, we&apos;re told that if you keep the commandments, you&apos;ll be able to do as Jehovah instructs you.
		I guess that specific passage is a bit circular in logic though.
		If you do what you&apos;re told, you&apos;ll be given the strength needed to do what you&apos;re told.
	</p>
</section>
<section id="straw_man">
	<h2>Straw man</h2>
	<p>
		It seems to me like the Book of Mormon is trying to show that non-believers are wrong not to believe, by making even those that see evidence in the book not believe.
		Even with evidence, these people turn away from the lord, their god.
		This doesn&apos;t match reality.
		People that don&apos;t follow Jehovah tend not to believe in him because there&apos;s a severe <strong>*lack*</strong> of evidence.
		There&apos;s no valid reason for us to believe, so we don&apos;t.
		Take for example the following passage:
	</p>
	<div class="cited-quotation">
		<cite>1 Nephi 3:29 - 3:31</cite>
		<blockquote>
			<p>
				And it came to pass as they smote us with a rod, behold, an angel of the Lord came and stood before them, and he spake unto them, saying:
				Why do ye smite your younger brother with a rod?
				Know ye not that the Lord hath chosen him to be a ruler over you, and this because of your iniquities?
				Behold ye shall go up to Jerusalem again, and the Lord will deliver Laban into your hands.
			</p>
			<p>
				And after the angel had spoken unto us, he departed.
			</p>
			<p>
				And after the angel had departed, Laman and Lemuel again began to murmur, saying:
				How is it possible that the Lord will deliver Laban into our hands? Behold, he is a mighty man, and he can command fifty, yea, even he can slay fifty; then why not us? 
			</p>
		</blockquote>
	</div>
	<p>
		Here, Laman and Lemuel are hitting Nephi with a rod because Nephi is trying to get them to stay with him and complete their seemingly-impossible mission, assigned to them by Jehovah.
		At this point, Laman and Lemuel have not seen evidence of Jehovah, so they can&apos;t be blamed for not believing, though they really shouldn&apos;t be hitting their younger sibling over it.
		An angel shows up, telling them to knock it off, and explaining that the lord will ensure the one person standing in the way of their goal will be taken care of.
		An angel stands before them and they&apos;re doubting that a deity can take out one measly human?
		I mean, granted, this human is strong, skilled, and commands an army, but versus a deity, what match are they?
	</p>
	<p>
		I think most atheists would agree that seeing an actual angel would be evidence enough of Jehovah&apos;s existence, and we wouldn&apos;t doubt his power.
		I mean, we might doubt that he&apos;s all-powerful, but we&apos;d know he has enough power to take out one individual.
		I mean, he did create the cosmos, after all.
		This theme of disbelief in the face of evidence is continued later, too.
		The whole point of atheism is that there <strong>*isn&apos;t*</strong> evidence.
		If there was, we wouldn&apos;t be atheists any more.
	</p>
	<p>
		Later, these two rebel against the orders of Jehovah again, somehow forgetting he&apos;s got a plan and everything&apos;s going to be fine if they just do as they&apos;re told.
		So, Nephi has to step in and tell them off, reminding them Jehovah&apos;s real and got stuff cooking.
		As Nephi asked:
	</p>
	<div class="cited-quotation">
		<cite>1 Nephi 7:10</cite>
		<blockquote>
			<p>
				How is it that ye have forgotten that ye have seen an angel of the Lord?
			</p>
		</blockquote>
	</div>
	<p>
		Even being reminded, these two elder siblings of Nephi remain on the offensive, and try to kill their younger sibling.
		A bit later, they&apos;re finally convinced to calm the heck down, and even repent for their actions, but the point is still clear.
		These two aren&apos;t simply non-believers, they believe and just aren&apos;t followers of Jehovah.
		Christians have a tendency to think you&apos;re &quot;rejecting&quot; their god if you don&apos;t believe in him.
		You can&apos;t reject what you don&apos;t believe to be real though.
		These two characters are later necessary for some major racism, but aside from that, their main purpose seems to be to portray the attitude on those that don&apos;t follow Jehovah, but with a very different attitude than people that actually don&apos;t follow Jehovah tend to have.
		By misrepresenting us atheists as actively rebellious instead of as simply not seeing a reason to believe, it makes it much easier for the Mormons to claim we&apos;re wrong.
	</p>
	<p>
		Later still, we even see a direct confirmation that these two are denying what they&apos;ve seen.
		Laman&apos;s seen speaking here, claiming the angels aren&apos;t talking to Nephi, even though one of them earlier even showed himself to them:
	</p>
	<div class="cited-quotation">
		<cite>1 Nephi 16:38</cite>
		<blockquote>
			<p>
				Now, he says that the Lord has talked with him, and also that angels have ministered unto him.
				But behold, we know that he lies unto us; and he tells us these things, and he worketh many things by his cunning arts, that he may deceive our eyes, thinking, perhaps, that he may lead us away into some strange wilderness; and after he has led us away, he has thought to make himself a king and a ruler over us, that he may do with us according to his will and pleasure.
				And after this manner did my brother Laman stir up their hearts to anger. 
			</p>
		</blockquote>
	</div>
	<p>
		Clearly, the implication here is that people will deny very obvious evidence of Jehovah.
		It&apos;s an attempt to deny the actual reality, which is that there <strong>*is no*</strong> obvious evidence of Jehovah.
		All anyone has about him is circumstantial.
		No one ever sees hide nor hair of the guy.
		Here, we see that pointed out as well:
	</p>
	<div class="cited-quotation">
		<cite>1 Nephi 17:30</cite>
		<blockquote>
			<p>
				And notwithstanding they being led, the Lord their God, their Redeemer, going before them, leading them by day and giving light unto them by night, and doing all things for them which were expedient for man to receive, they hardened their hearts and blinded their minds, and reviled against Moses and against the true and living God.
			</p>
		</blockquote>
	</div>
	<p>
		... and again:
	</p>
	<div class="cited-quotation">
		<cite>1 Nephi 17:45 - 17:47</cite>
		<blockquote>
			<p>
				Ye are swift to do iniquity but slow to remember the Lord your God.
				Ye have seen an angel, and he spake unto you; yea, ye have heard his voice from time to time; and he hath spoken unto you in a still small voice, but ye were past feeling, that ye could not feel his words; wherefore, he has spoken unto you like unto the voice of thunder, which did cause the earth to shake as if it were to divide asunder.
			</p>
			<p>
				And ye also know that by the power of his almighty word he can cause the earth that it shall pass away; yea, and ye know that by his word he can cause the rough places to be made smooth, and smooth places shall be broken up.
				O, then, why is it, that ye can be so hard in your hearts?
			</p>
		</blockquote>
	</div>
	<p>
		I talked to the missionaries about this, and they don&apos;t seem to believe it to be a plot hole like I do.
		Instead, they think it&apos;s something called the pride cycle.
		You&apos;re in Jehovah&apos;s good graces and receiving blessings, but then you get arrogant and forget where those blessings are coming from.
		You start to disobey Jehovah, so you start to lose those blessings, at which point you get angry with him and disobey further, costing you more blessings.
		Eventually, you&apos;re so low that you have nowhere left to go but up, so you humble yourself, and pray for forgiveness.
		You start receiving blessings again, and see that Jehovah is on your side once more, so you try even harder to stay on his good side and you receive even more blessings for your efforts.
		And the cycle begins anew.
	</p>
	<p>
		Maybe this explains the behaviour of Laman and Lemuel, aside from the fact that they&apos;re getting curses to dissuade them from bad behaviour, not blessings to persuade them toward good behaviour.
		I think I can admit that.
		However, this &quot;pride cycle&quot; can also be looked at from another angle: as a blessings/curses cycle.
		Labelled as a pride/humility cycle, it appears that the cycle is fuelled by pride and humility.
		What if it&apos;s actually the blessings and curses fuelling the cycle?
		Clearly, that&apos;s not the case in the Book of Mormon, as the causal relationship is clearly displayed there.
		However, in the real world, Jehovah doesn&apos;t assert his presence enough for us to even be sure he exists.
		People may get prideful based on situation, then humble when everything falls apart.
		When seen from that angle, we have a picture of a world in which the blessings and curses come regardless of behaviour, and it&apos;s behaviour that&apos;s being affected by it.
		If we ignore behaviour, this blessings cycle looks a lot like my own luck cycle.
		I&apos;m not following Jehovah on and off because I&apos;m not following him at all; I&apos;m an atheist.
		Yet the cycle appears to happen just the same.
		If I&apos;m not invoking the wrath and love of Jehovah, and instead just invoking his wrath full-time, the cycle must be completely independent of Jehovah.
		It&apos;s not a pride-driven cycle, and blessings have nothing to do with it.
	</p>
	<p>
		For the record though, I&apos;d like to point out that I don&apos;t actually believe my fluctuating luck is actually caused by some sort of cosmic cycle.
		I&apos;ve noticed that when things go wrong, they all go wrong at once as if such a cycle were in a place, but the idea of said cycle is just a construct to explain what it looks like is happening, not what is actually happening.
	</p>
	<p>
		The missionaries say that the problem of Laman and Lemuel is that while they were good at upholding most of the qualities they should, the one that they were bad at was enduring until the end.
		They brought up how Judas, one of the twelve apostles, also couldn&apos;t endure to the end.
		He&apos;d seen Jesus perform miracles, so he knew the guy to be <del>magical</del> <ins>supernatural</ins>, yet he still sold Jesus out for a little bit of cash.
		I mean, c&apos;mon.
		If you believe there&apos;s an afterlife, are you going to sell out the person helping you get to the good version of it?
		This isn&apos;t all about endurance until the end.
		It&apos;s also about loyalty and even self-preservation.
	</p>
	<div class="cited-quotation">
		<cite>Mosiah 2:11 - 2:13</cite>
		<blockquote>
			<p>
				For behold, and also his blood atoneth for the sins of those who have fallen by the transgression of Adam, who have died not knowing the will of God concerning them, or who have ignorantly sinned.
			</p>
			<p>
				But wo, wo unto him who knoweth that he rebelleth against God! For salvation cometh to none such except it be through repentance and faith on the Lord Jesus Christ.
			</p>
			<p>
				And the Lord God hath sent his holy prophets among all the children of men, to declare these things to every kindred, nation, and tongue, that thereby whosoever should believe that Christ should come, the same might receive remission of their sins, and rejoice with exceedingly great joy, even as though he had already come among them.
			</p>
		</blockquote>
	</div>
	<p>
		We&apos;ve got a couple problems in these passages.
		First, you can&apos;t rebel while being unaware.
		If you do something that some being that you don&apos;t know to exist doesn&apos;t like, that&apos;s not rebelling.
		You can&apos;t mistakenly or unknowingly rebel.
		That&apos;s not what rebelling is.
		This is another of those times where the book tries to frame one thing as another, so it will <strong>*look to believers*</strong> that non-believers are just acting up, and not that we legitimately see no reason to believe.
	</p>
	<p>
		Second, we&apos;re told that those that are in fact ignorant are forgiven.
		That means by spreading the word of Jesus, you&apos;re doing people harm.
		If they believe, they&apos;ve got to jump through hoops to be forgiven.
		But if they don&apos;t, they don&apos;t.
		Not knowing is thus, according to these words, safer.
		But then we&apos;re told that salvation only comes to those that repent and have faith.
		Given the context, I at first assumed that it means that only those that believe will only be forgiven through these measures.
		Otherwise, this passage directly contradicts the one prior.
		But then, we&apos;re told that you have to believe that Jesus will come (future tense, seeing as this was supposedly written before Jesus had supposedly come) and repent to be saved, so being ignorant is exactly one of the things that can damn you.
		So not knowing is unforgivable after all.
	</p>
</section>
<section id="offerings">
	<h2>Offerings</h2>
	<div class="cited-quotation">
		<cite>1 Nephi 5:9, 7:22</cite>
		<blockquote>
			<p>
				And it came to pass that they did rejoice exceedingly, and did offer sacrifice and burnt offerings unto the Lord; and they gave thanks unto the God of Israel.
			</p>
			<p>
				And it came to pass that we did come down unto the tent of our father.
				And after I and my brethren and all the house of Ishmael had come down unto the tent of my father, they did give thanks unto the Lord their God; and they did offer sacrifice and burnt offerings unto him.
			</p>
		</blockquote>
	</div>
	<div class="cited-quotation">
		<cite>Mosiah 2:3</cite>
		<blockquote>
			<p>
				And they also took of the firstlings of their flocks, that they might offer sacrifice and burnt offerings according to the law of Moses;
			</p>
		</blockquote>
	</div>
	<p>
		You&apos;re supposed to burn offerings for Jehovah.
		Just sayin&apos;.
	</p>
	<p>
		I hadn&apos;t gotten a chance to ask the missionaries about this yet, but it came up in a conversation about other things.
		They said we no longer need to make offerings because Jesus already made the ultimate offering of himself on our behalf.
	</p>
</section>
<section id="plates">
	<h2>Various plates</h2>
	<div class="cited-quotation">
		<cite>1 Nephi 5:18 - 5:19</cite>
		<blockquote>
			<p>
				That these plates of brass should go forth unto all nations, kindreds, tongues, and people who were of his seed.
			</p>
			<p>
				Wherefore, he said that these plates of brass should never perish; neither should they be dimmed any more by time.
				And he prophesied many things concerning his seed.
			</p>
		</blockquote>
	</div>
	<p>
		The plates mentioned above are the brass plates stolen by Nephi from Laban after the former killed the latter.
		(Jehovah orders Nephi to kill Laban several times, and eventually he caves and does it, before stealing the plates Jehovah sent him to recover.)
		Supposedly though, these plates will never perish or be &quot;dimmed&quot;.
		I&apos;m guessing that dimming here is referring to the plates becoming corroded, though it might instead refer to them becoming soiled.
		Perhaps even both.
		In any case though, if these plates are to last forever, where are they now?
		Seriously.
		Perhaps they disappeared with the Plates of Nephi, which were supposedly taken to heaven specifically so no one could ever prove their existence?
		Also, see this passage on both the brass plates and the Plates of Nephi:
	</p>
	<div class="cited-quotation">
		<cite>Mosiah 1:3 - 1:6</cite>
		<blockquote>
			<p>
				And he also taught them concerning the records which were engraven on the plates of brass, saying:
				My sons, I would that ye should remember that were it not for these plates, which contain these records and these commandments, we must have suffered in ignorance, even at this present time, not knowing the mysteries of God.
			</p>
			<p>
				For it were not possible that our father, Lehi, could have remembered all these things, to have taught them to his children, except it were for the help of these plates; for he having been taught in the language of the Egyptians therefore he could read these engravings, and teach them to his children, that thereby they could teach them to their children, and so fulfilling the commandments of God, even down to this present time.
			</p>
			<p>
				I say unto you, my sons, were it not for these things, which have been kept and preserved by the hand of God, that we might read and understand of his mysteries, and have his commandments always before our eyes, that even our fathers would have dwindled in unbelief, and we should have been like unto our brethren, the Lamanites, who know nothing concerning these things, or even do not believe them when they are taught them, because of the traditions of their fathers, which are not correct.
			</p>
			<p>
				O my sons, I would that ye should remember that these sayings are true, and also that these records are true.
				And behold, also the plates of Nephi, which contain the records and the sayings of our fathers from the time they left Jerusalem until now, and they are true; and we can know of their surety because we have them before our eyes.
			</p>
		</blockquote>
	</div>
	<p>
		Here, we&apos;re told that someone that hasn&apos;t seem the plates won&apos;t know that their contents are true.
		So ... was it really a good idea to take the plates away to heaven where no one would see them and be made aware that the stories they held were true?
		Also, I question whether seeing the plates would assure any rational-minded person that what they said was to be believed.
		I mean, we&apos;ve found tonnes of ancient tablets containing mythologies from several religions, such as those produced by the ancient Greeks.
		But does anyone believe in Zeus, one god the plates tell us about?
		Not really.
		Seeing old plates with old writings tells us someone wrote the words long ago, but it doesn&apos;t tell us the words are true.
	</p>
</section>
<section id="inbreeding">
	<h2>Inbreeding</h2>
	<p>
		Lehi takes his spouse and children into the wilderness, away from Jerusalem, upon request by Jehovah.
		They don&apos;t go too far though, as when Jehovah commands the children to return long enough to recover the brass plates from their owner in Jerusalem, they&apos;re able to comply.
		Jehovah want Lehi&apos;s children to breed though, to create his new people, but all the children are male.
		When they murder the owner and steal the plates, they also take away the owner&apos;s slave, Zoram, and convince him to live with them in the wilderness.
		However, the slave is male too.
		So to breed, they need females, and Jehovah tells them to bring a specific other family with them into the wilderness.
	</p>
	<div class="cited-quotation">
		<cite>1 Nephi 7:1 - 7:2</cite>
		<blockquote>
			<p>
				And now I would that ye might know, that after my father, Lehi, had made an end of prophesying concerning his seed, it came to pass that the Lord spake unto him again, saying that it was not meet for him, Lehi, that he should take his family into the wilderness alone; but that his sons should take daughters to wife, that they might raise up seed unto the Lord in the land of promise.
			</p>
			<p>
				And it came to pass that the Lord commanded him that I, Nephi, and my brethren, should again return unto the land of Jerusalem, and bring down Ishmael and his family into the wilderness.
			</p>
		</blockquote>
	</div>
	<p>
		So they do as they were commanded again.
		They talk this family into coming out into the wilderness with them, and the children of the two families marry and breed.
		There&apos;s a few more people though, as we see from this passage:
	</p>
	<div class="cited-quotation">
		<cite>1 Nephi 7:6</cite>
		<blockquote>
			<p>
				And it came to pass that as we journeyed in the wilderness, behold Laman and Lemuel, and two of the daughters of Ishmael, and the two sons of Ishmael and their families, did rebel against us; yea, against me, Nephi, and Sam, and their father, Ishmael, and his wife, and his three other daughters. 
			</p>
		</blockquote>
	</div>
	<p>
		The mentioned rebellion ends up ended a bit later when Jehovah steps in, but take a look at who&apos;s there.
		We have the four sons of Lehi and Sariah, Ishmael, Ishmael&apos;s wife, the five daughters of Ishmael, the two sons of Ishmael, the two wives of the sons of Ishmael, and Ishmael&apos;s grandchildren.
		Lehi, Sariah, and Zoram aren&apos;t present in this scene, but the listed party&apos;s going to meet up with them.
		If you notice, there are four unwed males and five unwed females, which means one of the unwed females gets paired up with Zoram, adding his $a[DNA] to the mix.
	</p>
	<div class="cited-quotation">
		<cite>1 Nephi 16:7</cite>
		<blockquote>
			<p>
				And it came to pass that I, Nephi, took one of the daughters of Ishmael to wife; and also, my brethren took of the daughters of Ishmael to wife; and also Zoram took the eldest daughter of Ishmael to wife.
			</p>
		</blockquote>
	</div>
	<p>
		So in the complete party, everyone&apos;s entire genetics can be traced back to some combination of Lehi, Sariah, Zoram, Ishmael, Ishmael&apos;s wife, and the two wives of Ishmael&apos;s sons.
		That&apos;s seven people.
		After that, they travel pretty far out, and end up in the land of promise.
		Along the way, they breed, and when they get there, they breed.
		The first generation after this might be able to avoid inbreeding, but after that, all later generations are guaranteed to be composed entirely of inbred people.
		Jehovah&apos;s entire new people, the Nephites, are inbred, as as are their enemy, the Lamanites, who branched off from this same set of people.
	</p>
</section>
<section id="virginity">
	<h2>Visible virginity?</h2>
	<p>
		Here&apos;s an exert I found confusing:
	</p>
	<div class="cited-quotation">
		<cite>1 Nephi 11:13 - 11:15</cite>
		<blockquote>
			<p>
				And it came to pass that I looked and beheld the great city of Jerusalem, and also other cities.
				And I beheld the city of Nazareth; and in the city of Nazareth I beheld a virgin, and she was exceedingly fair and white.
			</p>
			<p>
				And it came to pass that I saw the heavens open; and an angel came down and stood before me; and he said unto me:
				Nephi, what beholdest thou?
			</p>
			<p>
				And I said unto him: A virgin, most beautiful and fair above all other virgins.
			</p>
		</blockquote>
	</div>
	<p>
		Nephi is being shown a vision by the Holy Spirit.
		The spirit has taken a corporeal form and asks Nephi to look.
		When he does, he sees the spirit has vanished, and behind where he&apos;d been standing he sees the scene from the above passage.
		Somehow, he can see this person&apos;s virginity, and instead of calling her a person or a maiden, calls her a virgin.
		That&apos;s what he sees in her: she&apos;s never had sex.
		First of all, how would he even see that?
		What does virginity look like?
		But secondly, why is that the thing he points out about her?
		The only explanation is that it needs to be made clear who she is to the reader, and it is later revealed that she&apos;s the virgin mother of the messiah.
		This seems like a bit of a plot hole to me.
	</p>
</section>
<section id="redemption">
	<h2>Redemption</h2>
	<div class="cited-quotation">
		<cite>1 Nephi 11:32 - 11:33</cite>
		<blockquote>
			<p>
				And it came to pass that the angel spake unto me again, saying:
				Look!
				And I looked and beheld the Lamb of God, that he was taken by the people; yea, the Son of the everlasting God was judged of the world; and I saw and bear record.
			</p>
			<p>
				And I, Nephi, saw that he was lifted up upon the cross and slain for the sins of the world.
			</p>
		</blockquote>
	</div>
	<p>
		One of the main themes of the Abrahamic religions is that we&apos;re all flawed, and for us to be saved, someone had to pay the price.
		A just and fair god would not punish one person for the crimes of another.
		Jehovah is not a just god.
		If we deserve forgiveness, a just god could forgive us without someone else taking the blame for us.
		If we don&apos;t deserve forgiveness, someone taking on our punishments shouldn&apos;t make us magically forgiveable.
		The proper thing to do would be to make us pay for our own crimes, then once we&apos;ve made amends, forgive us.
		This whole messiah thing is just a way for people to make themselves feel good because they think they&apos;re getting out of what they think they deserve.
		To someone with a real conscience though, the thought of having someone else take on your punishment for you is utterly appalling.
	</p>
	<div class="cited-quotation">
		<cite>2 Nephi 26:24</cite>
		<blockquote>
			<p>
				He doeth not anything save it be for the benefit of the world; for he loveth the world, even that he layeth down his own life that he may draw all men unto him. Wherefore, he commandeth none that they shall not partake of his salvation.
			</p>
		</blockquote>
	</div>
	<p>
		We&apos;re also told that Jehovah does everything out of love for the world, but what definition of love involves cursing people?
		What form of love involves cutting people off from your presence eternally?
		What form of love involves writing terrible rules that no one can always follow, then punishing them for it?
		And how is sacrificing yourself to yourself to bypass rules you chose yourself to implement supposed to be an act of love?
	</p>
	<p>
		I talked to the missionaries about this, and they claim Jesus need not have dies on the cross to save us.
		It was his atonement in a garden that saved us.
		The missionaries say though that Jesus was only killed to fulfil the law of Moses, which is basically an eye for an eye.
		But even then, they say it was only because the humans wanted that.
		If they&apos;d been reasonable people, Jesus wouldn&apos;t&apos;ve needed to die.
		They just wanted to kill him and he put up with that.
		Additionally, putting up with that while still remaining spiritual, even while all his rights were being trampled on, including his right to life, was supposed to serve as an example for us.
		We should remain spiritual even in the face of severe pain and death.
		Of course, this doesn&apos;t fix the fact that if you deserve forgiveness, you deserve it even if no one atones on your behalf, and that if you don&apos;t deserve forgiveness, you don&apos;t deserve it even if someone <strong>*does*</strong> atone on your behalf.
		The atonement of Jesus still doesn&apos;t make sense as a way for anyone to get to heaven besides Jesus himself getting in.
	</p>
</section>
<section id="hell">
	<h2>Hell</h2>
	<p>
		The Mormons say no one goes to hell, and instead, everyone on earth will instead go to one of several heavens.
		So why does the Book of Mormon claim there to be a hell?
	</p>
	<div class="cited-quotation">
		<cite>1 Nephi 14:3</cite>
		<blockquote>
			<p>
				And that great pit, which hath been digged for them by that great and abominable church, which was founded by the devil and his children, that he might lead away the souls of men down to hell-yea, that great pit which hath been digged for the destruction of men shall be filled by those who digged it, unto their utter destruction, saith the Lamb of God; not the destruction of the soul, save it be the casting of it into that hell which hath no end.
			</p>
		</blockquote>
	</div>
	<p>
		The Book of Mormon also claims that there are only two churches, and everyone has to belong to one.
		That&apos;s right, if you believe nothing and follow no one, you&apos;re somehow a part of a church anyway: the devil&apos;s church:
	</p>
	<div class="cited-quotation">
		<cite>1 Nephi 14:10</cite>
		<blockquote>
			<p>
				And he said unto me:
				Behold there are save two churches only; the one is the church of the Lamb of God, and the other is the church of the devil; wherefore, whoso belongeth not to the church of the Lamb of God belongeth to that great church, which is the mother of abominations; and she is the whore of all the earth.
			</p>
		</blockquote>
	</div>
	<p>
		In other words, if you&apos;re not of the Mormon faith, you&apos;re going to hell.
	</p>
	<p>
		This hell is said to be where the wicked go, because they&apos;re filthy and no filth is allowed in the kingdom of Jehovah.
	</p>
	<div class="cited-quotation">
		<cite>1 Nephi 15:34 - 15:35</cite>
		<blockquote>
			<p>
				But behold, I say unto you, the kingdom of God is not filthy, and there cannot any unclean thing enter into the kingdom of God; wherefore there must needs be a place of filthiness prepared for that which is filthy. 
			</p>
			<p>
				And there is a place prepared, yea, even that awful hell of which I have spoken, and the devil is the preparator of it; wherefore the final state of the souls of men is to dwell in the kingdom of God, or to be cast out because of that justice of which I have spoken.
			</p>
		</blockquote>
	</div>
	<p>
		Hell is actually mentioned several more times, though not always in was that directly say anyone will go there.
		It&apos;s also outright said that you have to believe in Jesus to be saved:
	</p>
	<div class="cited-quotation">
		<cite>2 Nephi 2:9</cite>
		<blockquote>
			<p>
				Wherefore, he is the firstfruits unto God, inasmuch as he shall make intercession for all the children of men; and they that believe in him shall be saved.
			</p>
		</blockquote>
	</div>
	<p>
		This contradicts the Mormon belief that everyone on earth will be saved, regardless of faith.
		Again, it&apos;s said that your choices can get you sent to hell:
	</p>
	<div class="cited-quotation">
		<cite>2 Nephi 2:27 - 2:29</cite>
		<blockquote>
			<p>
				Wherefore, men are free according to the flesh; and all things are given them which are expedient unto man.
				And they are free to choose liberty and eternal life, through the great Mediator of all men, or to choose captivity and death, according to the captivity and power of the devil; for he seeketh that all men might be miserable like unto himself.
			</p>
			<p>
				And now, my sons, I would that ye should look to the great Mediator, and hearken unto his great commandments; and be faithful unto his words, and choose eternal life, according to the will of his Holy Spirit;
			</p>
			<p>
				And not choose eternal death, according to the will of the flesh and the evil which is therein, which giveth the spirit of the devil power to captivate, to bring you down to hell, that he may reign over you in his own kingdom.
			</p>
		</blockquote>
	</div>
	<p>
		More talk of hell after being judged:
	</p>
	<div class="cited-quotation">
		<cite>2 Nephi 9:15 - 9:16</cite>
		<blockquote>
			<p>
				And it shall come to pass that when all men shall have passed from this first death unto life, insomuch as they have become immortal, they must appear before the judgment-seat of the Holy One of Israel; and then cometh the judgment, and then must they be judged according to the holy judgment of God.
			</p>
			<p>
				And assuredly, as the Lord liveth, for the Lord God hath spoken it, and it is his eternal word, which cannot pass away, that they who are righteous shall be righteous still, and they who are filthy shall be filthy still; wherefore, they who are filthy are the devil and his angels; and they shall go away into everlasting fire, prepared for them; and their torment is as a lake of fire and brimstone, whose flame ascendeth up forever and ever and has no end.
			</p>
		</blockquote>
	</div>
	<p>
		Here, we see that those who don&apos;t get baptised and have perfect faith in Jehovah must be damned:
	</p>
	<div class="cited-quotation">
		<cite>2 Nephi 9:23 - 9:24</cite>
		<blockquote>
			<p>
				And he commandeth all men that they must repent, and be baptized in his name, having perfect faith in the Holy One of Israel, or they cannot be saved in the kingdom of God. 
			</p>
			<p>
				And if they will not repent and believe in his name, and be baptized in his name, and endure to the end, they must be damned; for the Lord God, the Holy One of Israel, has spoken it.
			</p>
		</blockquote>
	</div>
	<p>
		Also, liars those who commit whoredoms go to hell:
	</p>
	<div class="cited-quotation">
		<cite>2 Nephi 9:30 - 9:38</cite>
		<blockquote>
			<p>
				But wo unto the rich, who are rich as to the things of the world.
				For because they are rich they despise the poor, and they persecute the meek, and their hearts are upon their treasures; wherefore, their treasure is their god.
				And behold, their treasure shall perish with them also.
			</p>
			<p>
				And wo unto the deaf that will not hear; for they shall perish.
			</p>
			<p>
				Wo unto the blind that will not see; for they shall perish also.
			</p>
			<p>
				Wo unto the uncircumcised of heart, for a knowledge of their iniquities shall smite them at the last day.
			</p>
			<p>
				Wo unto the liar, for he shall be thrust down to hell.
			</p>
			<p>
				Wo unto the murderer who deliberately killeth, for he shall die.
			</p>
			<p>
				Wo unto them who commit whoredoms, for they shall be thrust down to hell.
			</p>
			<p>
				Yea, wo unto those that worship idols, for the devil of all devils delighteth in them.
			</p>
			<p>
				And, in fine, wo unto all those who die in their sins; for they shall return to God, and behold his face, and remain in their sins.
			</p>
		</blockquote>
	</div>
	<p>
		For context, I included the surrounding passages, though these passages don&apos;t say you&apos;ll go to hell for the crimes they mention.
	</p>
	<p>
		And we have more talk of evil-doers going to hell ... :
	</p>
	<div class="cited-quotation">
		<cite>2 Nephi 26:10</cite>
		<blockquote>
			<p>
				And when these things have passed away a speedy destruction cometh unto my people; for, notwithstanding the pains of my soul, I have seen it; wherefore, I know that it shall come to pass; and they sell themselves for naught; for, for the reward of their pride and their foolishness they shall reap destruction; for because they yield unto the devil and choose works of darkness rather than light, therefore they must go down to hell.
			</p>
		</blockquote>
	</div>
	<p>
		Here, we&apos;re told that the Gentiles can only be saved through repentance, which of course means there&apos;s a way for them not to be saved, again contradicting the Mormon belief that everyone will be saved:
	</p>
	<div class="cited-quotation">
		<cite>2 Nephi 6:12 - 6:15</cite>
		<blockquote>
			<p>
				And blessed are the Gentiles, they of whom the prophet has written; for behold, if it so be that they shall repent and fight not against Zion, and do not unite themselves to that great and abominable church, they shall be saved; for the Lord God will fulfil his covenants which he has made unto his children; and for this cause the prophet has written these things.
			</p>
			<p>
				Wherefore, they that fight against Zion and the covenant people of the Lord shall lick up the dust of their feet; and the people of the Lord shall not be ashamed.
				For the people of the Lord are they who wait for him; for they still wait for the coming of the Messiah.
			</p>
			<p>
				And behold, according to the words of the prophet, the Messiah will set himself again the second time to recover them; wherefore, he will manifest himself unto them in power and great glory, unto the destruction of their enemies, when that day cometh when they shall believe in him; and none will he destroy that believe in him.
			</p>
			<p>
				And they that believe not in him shall be destroyed, both by fire, and by tempest, and by earthquakes, and by bloodsheds, and by pestilence, and by famine. And they shall know that the Lord is God, the Holy One of Israel.
			</p>
		</blockquote>
	</div>
	<p>
		Oh yeah, I forgot to mention that non-believers will be destroyed.
		Hell isn&apos;t the only thing we get threatened with.
		This isn&apos;t the only time the book threatens us with outright destruction, either.
	</p>
	<div class="cited-quotation">
		<cite>2 Nephi 1:22</cite>
		<blockquote>
			<p>
				That ye may not be cursed with a sore cursing; and also, that ye may not incur the displeasure of a just God upon you, unto the destruction, yea, the eternal destruction of both soul and body.
			</p>
		</blockquote>
	</div>
	<p>
		We&apos;re also presented with these interesting passages:
	</p>
	<div class="cited-quotation">
		<cite>2 Nephi 28:7 - 28:15</cite>
		<blockquote>
			<p>
				Yea, and there shall be many which shall say:
				Eat, drink, and be merry, for tomorrow we die; and it shall be well with us.
			</p>
			<p>
				And there shall also be many which shall say:
				Eat, drink, and be merry; nevertheless, fear God-he will justify in committing a little sin; yea, lie a little, take the advantage of one because of his words, dig a pit for thy neighbor; there is no harm in this; and do all these things, for tomorrow we die; and if it so be that we are guilty, God will beat us with a few stripes, and at last we shall be saved in the kingdom of God.
			</p>
			<p>
				Yea, and there shall be many which shall teach after this manner, false and vain and foolish doctrines, and shall be puffed up in their hearts, and shall seek deep to hide their counsels from the Lord; and their works shall be in the dark.
			</p>
			<p>
				And the blood of the saints shall cry from the ground against them.
			</p>
			<p>
				Yea, they have all gone out of the way; they have become corrupted.
			</p>
			<p>
				Because of pride, and because of false teachers, and false doctrine, their churches have become corrupted, and their churches are lifted up; because of pride they are puffed up.
			</p>
			<p>
				They rob the poor because of their fine sanctuaries; they rob the poor because of their fine clothing; and they persecute the meek and the poor in heart, because in their pride they are puffed up.
			</p>
			<p>
				They wear stiff necks and high heads; yea, and because of pride, and wickedness, and abominations, and whoredoms, they have all gone astray save it be a few, who are the humble followers of Christ; nevertheless, they are led, that in many instances they do err because they are taught by the precepts of men.
			</p>
			<p>
				O the wise, and the learned, and the rich, that are puffed up in the pride of their hearts, and all those who preach false doctrines, and all those who commit whoredoms, and pervert the right way of the Lord, wo, wo, wo be unto them, saith the Lord God Almighty, for they shall be thrust down to hell!
			</p>
		</blockquote>
	</div>
	<p>
		It sounds to me that it&apos;s telling us that the thought that we&apos;ll be saved regardless of what we do is false.
		This everyone-gets-into-one-of-the-heavens idea the Mormons teach seems to be at odd with their own holy book.
		Such a belief is one of the signs of the corruption of the church!
		I&apos;m guessing the robbing of the poor would be the tithing Mormons are expected to pay, likely regardless of income level.
		I&apos;m not entirely sure on this though.
		I haven&apos;t looked into it.
		The belief that they&apos;ll be saved despite sin is directly addressed though.
		We&apos;re also told that it&apos;s the devil <strong>*himself*</strong> that&apos;ll try to convince us that there&apos;s no hell:
	</p>
	<div class="cited-quotation">
		<cite>2 Nephi 28:18 - 28:23</cite>
		<blockquote>
			<p>
				But behold, that great and abominable church, the whore of all the earth, must tumble to the earth, and great must be the fall thereof.
			</p>
			<p>
				For the kingdom of the devil must shake, and they which belong to it must needs be stirred up unto repentance, or the devil will grasp them with his everlasting chains, and they be stirred up to anger, and perish;
			</p>
			<p>
				For behold, at that day shall he rage in the hearts of the children of men, and stir them up to anger against that which is good.
			</p>
			<p>
				And others will he pacify, and lull them away into carnal security, that they will say: All is well in Zion; yea, Zion prospereth, all is well-and thus the devil cheateth their souls, and leadeth them away carefully down to hell.
			</p>
			<p>
				And behold, others he flattereth away, and telleth them there is no hell; and he saith unto them:
				I am no devil, for there is none-and thus he whispereth in their ears, until he grasps them with his awful chains, from whence there is no deliverance.
			</p>
			<p>
				Yea, they are grasped with death, and hell; and death, and hell, and the devil, and all that have been seized therewith must stand before the throne of God, and be judged according to their works, from whence they must go into the place prepared for them, even a lake of fire and brimstone, which is endless torment.
			</p>
		</blockquote>
	</div>
	<p>
		And more ... :
	</p>
	<div class="cited-quotation">
		<cite>Jacob 3:11</cite>
		<blockquote>
			<p>
				O my brethren, hearken unto my words; arouse the faculties of your souls; shake yourselves that ye may awake from the slumber of death; and loose yourselves from the pains of hell that ye may not become angels to the devil, to be cast into that lake of fire and brimstone which is the second death.
			</p>
		</blockquote>
	</div>
	<p>
		If found guilty of rejecting the words of the prophets - the indirect word of Yahweh - it&apos;s into the lake of fire with you, so you can suffer endless torment:
	</p>
	<div class="cited-quotation">
		<cite>Jacob 6:8 - 6:10</cite>
		<blockquote>
			<p>
				Behold, will ye reject these words?
				Will ye reject the words of the prophets; and will ye reject all the words which have been spoken concerning Christ, after so many have spoken concerning him; and deny the good word of Christ, and the power of God, and the gift of the Holy Ghost, and quench the Holy Spirit, and make a mock of the great plan of redemption, which hath been laid for you?
			</p>
			<p>
				Know ye not that if ye will do these things, that the power of the redemption and the resurrection, which is in Christ, will bring you to stand with shame and awful guilt before the bar of God?
			</p>
			<p>
				And according to the power of justice, for justice cannot be denied, ye must go away into that lake of fire and brimstone, whose flames are unquenchable, and whose smoke ascendeth up forever and ever, which lake of fire and brimstone is endless torment.
			</p>
		</blockquote>
	</div>
	<p>
		Denying the Christ is <strong>*the*</strong> unpardonable sin.
		Not murder.
		Not rape.
		Not malice of any kind.
		Simply denying that Jesus sacrificed (or is going to sacrifice, from the point of view of Sherem) himself to appease the wrath of his father for your lack of perfection (in other words, for being yourself) is the only thing that cannot be forgiven:
	</p>
	<div class="cited-quotation">
		<cite>Jacob 7:18 - 7:19</cite>
		<blockquote>
			<p>
				And he spake plainly unto them, that he had been deceived by the power of the devil.
				And he spake of hell, and of eternity, and of eternal punishment.
			</p>
			<p>
				And he said:
				I fear lest I have committed the unpardonable sin, for I have lied unto God; for I denied the Christ, and said that I believed the scriptures; and they truly testify of him.
				And because I have thus lied unto God I greatly fear lest my case shall be awful; but I confess unto God.
			</p>
		</blockquote>
	</div>
	<p>
		Eternal punishment also awaits those that listen to the wrong spirit, and mistake it for the Holy Ghost.
		You don&apos;t know it, but you&apos;re sinning, so you&apos;ve got to suffer forever for it:
	</p>
	<div class="cited-quotation">
		<cite>Mosiah 2:32 - 2:33</cite>
		<blockquote>
			<p>
				But, O my people, beware lest there shall arise contentions among you, and ye list to obey the evil spirit, which was spoken of by my father Mosiah.
			</p>
			<p>
				For behold, there is a wo pronounced upon him who listeth to obey that spirit; for if he listeth to obey him, and remaineth and dieth in his sins, the same drinketh damnation to his own soul; for he receiveth for his wages an everlasting punishment, having transgressed the law of God contrary to his own knowledge.
			</p>
		</blockquote>
	</div>
	<p>
		If you listen to an evil spirit (which I assume to be Satan) instead of the things you&apos;re told Jehovah wants even though Jehovah never told you them himself, you&apos;re doomed to eternal torment.
		You shall get no mercy:
	</p>
	<div class="cited-quotation">
		<cite>Mosiah 2:37 - 2:39</cite>
		<blockquote>
			<p>
				I say unto you, that the man that doeth this, the same cometh out in open rebellion against God; therefore he listeth to obey the evil spirit, and becometh an enemy to all righteousness; therefore, the Lord has no place in him, for he dwelleth not in unholy temples.
			</p>
			<p>
				Therefore if that man repenteth not, and remaineth and dieth an enemy to God, the demands of divine justice do awaken his immortal soul to a lively sense of his own guilt, which doth cause him to shrink from the presence of the Lord, and doth fill his breast with guilt, and pain, and anguish, which is like an unquenchable fire, whose flame ascendeth up forever and ever.
			</p>
			<p>
				And now I say unto you, that mercy hath no claim on that man; therefore his final doom is to endure a never-ending torment.
			</p>
		</blockquote>
	</div>
	<p>
		I spoke with the missionaries about all these references in their holy book to a place they claim doesn&apos;t exist, and they claimed hell isn&apos;t a place, but a state of mind.
		It&apos;s a terrible state of mind in which you cannot continue to grow because you refuse to continue to learn.
		That sounds a lot like the state of mind experienced by those that hold onto religious beliefs despite all proof they see contradictory to their beliefs and against all reason.
		It&apos;s those that reject the claims of mysticism, magic, and miracles that don&apos;t have to live in such a state.
		A firm belief in science and a rejection of theology are therefore what keep you out of hell.
	</p>
</section>
<section id="blame">
	<h2>Passing blame</h2>
	<p>
		The Book of Mormon teaches followers that it&apos;s okay to just burst forth with your religious beliefs.
		It&apos;s not your fault.
		You&apos;re not doing it.
		It&apos;s the Jehovah&apos;s Holy Ghost, taking control of your body!
		More than a justification to yourself though, this is a justification to tell people that would otherwise try to hold you accountable for what you say.
	</p>
	<div class="cited-quotation">
		<cite>2 Nephi 1:27</cite>
		<blockquote>
			<p>
				And it must needs be that the power of God must be with him, even unto his commanding you that ye must obey.
				But behold, it was not he, but it was the Spirit of the Lord which was in him, which opened his mouth to utterance that he could not shut it.
			</p>
		</blockquote>
	</div>
</section>
<section id="logic">
	<h2>Bad logic</h2>
	<p>
		Let&apos;s take a look at a verse, then break down what it really says:
	</p>
	<div class="cited-quotation">
		<cite>2 Nephi 2:13</cite>
		<blockquote>
			<p>
				And if ye shall say there is no law, ye shall also say there is no sin.
				If ye shall say there is no sin, ye shall also say there is no righteousness.
				And if there be no righteousness there be no happiness.
				And if there be no righteousness nor happiness there be no punishment nor misery.
				And if these things are not there is no God.
				And if there is no God we are not, neither the earth; for there could have been no creation of things, neither to act nor to be acted upon; wherefore, all things must have vanished away.
			</p>
		</blockquote>
	</div>
	<p>
		The first part seems rather reasonable.
		A sin, according to the Mormons, is defined as the breaking of a commandment.
		Commandments are the laws given to us by Jehovah, so without these laws, sins by definition could not exist.
		After that, things start breaking down.
	</p>
	<p>
		Without sin, we have no righteousness.
		Are you sure about that?
		Remember, to sin is to break the laws given to us by Jehovah.
		Without those laws, we still have our own laws.
		Murder is unethical whether Jehovah forbids it or not.
		To do what is right has nothing to do with whether Jehovah told us to do it or not.
		In fact, I&apos;d take it a step further: all morality is subjective.
		What is righteous according to one isn&apos;t according to another.
		Jehovah, should he exist, is not at all exempt from this.
		Jehovah&apos;s morality is no more authoritative than anyone else&apos;s.
		Jehovah simply has all the power, and can impose his morals on everyone else.
		It&apos;s like when a large corporation has the massive amount of money needed to lobby for laws that allow the outsourcing of labour to countries that allow sweatshops.
		The corporation is able to throw its weight around to get access to sweatshops like it thinks are good.
		The rest of us know that sweatshops are immoral though.
		Having the power to impose your morals doesn&apos;t make your sense of morality a definitive guide.
		Morality, and thus righteousness, exist with or without Jehovah.
		Moratity, and thus righteousness, are completely subjective with or without Jehovah.
	</p>
	<p>
		Next, we&apos;re told that without righteousness, there can be no happiness.
		Again, this simply isn&apos;t true.
		People derive happiness from a lot of things, and doing morally just works isn&apos;t always where they get it from.
		If we&apos;re defining righteousness as the following of Jehovah&apos;s laws, which we shouldn&apos;t, much happiness can be had while ignoring these laws.
		Doing what we know to be right, even while ignoring the word of Jehovah, brings happiness to many.
		If we&apos;re defining righteousness as the following of a moral code, which we should, we again see that happiness can be had while performing neutral acts, that are neither righteous nor terrible.
		This seems in fact to be where most happiness comes from.
		For some people, doing things they know to be wrong brings them happiness as well.
		Doing the right thing can make one happy.
		Don&apos;t get me wrong.
		But a lot of happiness comes from other places.
	</p>
	<p>
		Next, we&apos;re told that without righteousness and happiness, there can be no punishment of misery.
		Let&apos;s start with misery.
		Imagine a world where all you could feel is misery.
		By definition, it would be a very miserable world.
		With misery being the only possible state, there would be nothing to contrast it with.
		And thus, we&apos;d have no need for a word that describes misery.
		Misery would still exist though.
		We just wouldn&apos;t know anything different than it.
		To punish someone is to cause them harm or displeasure because of something immoral they did.
		Without happiness, misery would be the only state.
		We can assume then that there&apos;s no continuum.
		You can&apos;t be more or less miserable than you already are, because to be more miserable, you&apos;d need less happiness, and to be less miserable, you&apos;d need more happiness.
		So without misery, no, there could be no punishment.
		But what about righteousness?
		Again, if we&apos;re claiming that Jehovah&apos;s word magically grants objective morality and thus the concept of righteousness, this is falls.
		You can be punished according to other, subjective forms of morality.
		However, if we&apos;re defining morality correctly, you can&apos;t be punished if there&apos;s no moral framework.
		It&apos;s difficult to find a way to eliminate all moral frameworks though.
		We instinctively know certain things to be good or bad according to our own internal sense of justice.
		So the claim holds up, but a world in which we could see the effects of there being no righteousness could not actually exist with us in it.
		So in the end, such a statement is meaningless.
	</p>
	<p>
		Next, we&apos;re told that if there is no law, sin, righteousness, happiness, punishment, and misery, there&apos;s no god.
		Gods could certainly exist with or without any of these things.
		They did spell &quot;god&quot; with an upper-case &quot;G&quot; though, so they mean Jehovah.
		Jehovah could not exist without these things because they are so ingrained in who he is.
		If they weren&apos;t, he wouldn&apos;t be the Jehovah described by the book.
		He&apos;d be someone else.
		In fact none of us would be who we are.
		We&apos;d all be someone else.
	</p>
	<p>
		And finally, we&apos;re told that if Jehovah doesn&apos;t exist, nothing else exists either.
		After all, he created it all, so if he wasn&apos;t here to crate it, it wouldn&apos;t have been created at all.
		What if some <strong>*other*</strong> god created it though?
		We don&apos;t need Jehovah specifically for us to exist.
		Or, what if, Jehovah forbid, we weren&apos;t created by any sort of gods at all and the supernatural simply doesn&apos;t exist?
		Why does our world need to have been created for it to exist?
		If you have some reason why, this same reason would apply to Jehovah.
		He couldn&apos;t exist either without someone to create him.
		But his creator would suffer from the same need to follow logic and be created as well.
		It&apos;s turtles all the way down.
		If creationism is correct, there eventually needs to be some powerful entity not subject to it.
		And if there&apos;s a powerful entity not subject to it, it proves that creation isn&apos;t necessary for existence.
		It proves that we <strong>*could*</strong> exist without Jehovah creating us, though I admit it doesn&apos;t prove that we <strong>*did*</strong> come into being without him.
		Only that we could, and therefore our existence cannot be considered proof of Jehovah or any other creator.
	</p>
	<p>
		If you look a bit closer though, you see one last bit of information.
		As discussed above, the word &quot;law&quot; in the passage clearly refers specifically to commandments given by Jehovah.
		Everything gets traced back to the stated law.
		Each link of the chain points back to the law.
		At one point, after the chain has branched a bit, we&apos;re informed that without several thing that are stated to not be able to exist without Jehovah&apos;s commandments, Jehovah himself couldn&apos;t exist.
		A sane person could tell you that if someone doesn&apos;t exist, they can&apos;t issue orders.
		However, this passage tries to claim the opposite: if Jehovah didn&apos;t issue orders, he wouldn&apos;t be able to exist.
		That alone should tell you this book is the rantings of a madperson.
	</p>
</section>
<section id="inheritance">
	<h2>Inheritance of blame</h2>
	<p>
		Children are held responsible for the sins of their parents.
		If people sin and have children, those children are required to repent for it.
		Otherwise, they can&apos;t be saved.
		In what way is that fair?
		A just god would never operate this way.
	</p>
	<div class="cited-quotation">
		<cite>2 Nephi 2:21</cite>
		<blockquote>
			<p>
				And the days of the children of men were prolonged, according to the will of God, that they might repent while in the flesh; wherefore, their state became a state of probation, and their time was lengthened, according to the commandments which the Lord God gave unto the children of men.
				For he gave commandment that all men must repent; for he showed unto all men that they were lost, because of the transgression of their parents.
			</p>
		</blockquote>
	</div>
	<p>
		Here, we see that theme again, but with a slightly different spin; the children of evil-doers aren&apos;t allowed to prosper
		Also, children need to be slaughtered for the crimes of their parents:
	</p>
	<div class="cited-quotation">
		<cite>2 Nephi 24:20 - 24:21</cite>
		<blockquote>
			<p>
				Thou shalt not be joined with them in burial, because thou hast destroyed thy land and slain thy people; the seed of evil-doers shall never be renowned.
			</p>
			<p>
				Prepare slaughter for his children for the iniquities of their fathers, that they do not rise, nor possess the land, nor fill the face of the world with cities.
			</p>
		</blockquote>
	</div>
</section>
<section id="procreation">
	<h2>Procreation</h2>
	<p>
		Apparently, Jehovah set up a system in which procreation was not possible without eating from a magic tree, then forbid eating from that tree:
	</p>
	<div class="cited-quotation">
		<cite>2 Nephi 2:22 - 2:23</cite>
		<blockquote>
			<p>
				And now, behold, if Adam had not transgressed he would not have fallen, but he would have remained in the garden of Eden.
				And all things which were created must have remained in the same state in which they were after they were created; and they must have remained forever, and had no end.
			</p>
			<p>
				And they would have had no children; wherefore they would have remained in a state of innocence, having no joy, for they knew no misery; doing no good, for they knew no sin.
			</p>
		</blockquote>
	</div>
</section>
<section id="racism">
	<h2>Racism</h2>
	<p>
		First, Jehovah foreshadows that he&apos;ll curse the Lemanites:
	</p>
	<div class="cited-quotation">
		<cite>1 Nephi 2:21, 2:23 - 2:24</cite>
		<blockquote>
			<p>
				And inasmuch as thy brethren shall rebel against thee, they shall be cut off from the presence of the Lord.
			</p>
			<p>
				For behold, in that day that they shall rebel against me, I will curse them even with a sore curse, and they shall have no power over thy seed except they shall rebel against me also.
			</p>
			<p>
				And if it so be that they rebel against me, they shall be a scourge unto thy seed, to stir them up in the ways of remembrance.
			</p>
		</blockquote>
	</div>
	<p>
		Later, Nephi sees in a vision that the seed of his brethren will become &quot;dark&quot;:
	</p>
	<div class="cited-quotation">
		<cite>1 Nephi 12:23</cite>
		<blockquote>
			<p>
				And it came to pass that I beheld, after they had dwindled in unbelief they became a dark, and loathsome, and a filthy people, full of idleness and all manner of abominations.
			</p>
		</blockquote>
	</div>
	<p>
		Finally, what has been foreshadowed comes to pass, and we see exactly what&apos;s going on:
	</p>
	<div class="cited-quotation">
		<cite>2 Nephi 5:21 - 5:25</cite>
		<blockquote>
			<p>
				And he had caused the cursing to come upon them, yea, even a sore cursing, because of their iniquity.
				For behold, they had hardened their hearts against him, that they had become like unto a flint; wherefore, as they were white, and exceedingly fair and delightsome, that they might not be enticing unto my people the Lord God did cause a skin of blackness to come upon them.
			</p>
			<p>
				And thus saith the Lord God: I will cause that they shall be loathsome unto thy people, save they shall repent of their iniquities.
			</p>
			<p>
				And cursed shall be the seed of him that mixeth with their seed; for they shall be cursed even with the same cursing.
				And the Lord spake it, and it was done.
			</p>
			<p>
				And because of their cursing which was upon them they did become an idle people, full of mischief and subtlety, and did seek in the wilderness for beasts of prey.
			</p>
			<p>
				And the Lord God said unto me:
				They shall be a scourge unto thy seed, to stir them up in remembrance of me; and inasmuch as they will not remember me, and hearken unto my words, they shall scourge them even unto destruction.
			</p>
		</blockquote>
	</div>
	<p>
		This is the Mormon origin story of black people!
		This has got several layers to it.
		First of all, it&apos;s claiming that black people are the cursed descendants of a people that refused to follow Jehovah, no matter how many times Jehovah made himself known to them.
		It&apos;s pretty much a way to justify racism against Africans.
		After all, they deserve it, right?
		They&apos;re only black because they wouldn&apos;t follow the one true god!
		Next, there&apos;s a more subtle layer.
		The people are cursed to be dark-skinned to make them unenticing.
		In other words, it&apos;s calling lack people ugly.
		Next, it calls them loathsome, unless they repent.
		I&apos;m unclear on whether this repentance is supposed to turn them white again, or just make them no longer loathsome.
		If it&apos;s supposed to turn them white, it&apos;s again a justification for racism.
		I mean, if they&apos;d changed their ways, they&apos;d no longer have dark skin, right?
		And finally, the Nephites are told not to breed with the Lamenites or their offspring will suffer the same curse.
		It&apos;s a justification for segregation of the gene pool.
		We also see that black people are an idle people that engages in mischief, again claiming them to be inferior, and they&apos;re a scourge on the white people.
		Wow.
		This is just horrible.
		And people actually put their trust in this book!
	</p>
	<p>
		Later, it seems that the repentance of the blacks <strong>*is*</strong> stated to turn them white again:
	</p>
	<div class="cited-quotation">
		<cite>2 Nephi 30:6</cite>
		<blockquote>
			<p>
				And then shall they rejoice; for they shall know that it is a blessing unto them from the hand of God; and their scales of darkness shall begin to fall from their eyes; and many generations shall not pass away among them, save they shall be a white and a delightsome people.
			</p>
		</blockquote>
	</div>
	<p>
		It&apos;s also stated that the Nephites&apos; skin may be darkened because of their sins, so they might end up even darker than the Lamenites:
	</p>
	<div class="cited-quotation">
		<cite>Jacob 3:8</cite>
		<blockquote>
			<p>
				O my brethren, I fear that unless ye shall repent of your sins that their skins will be whiter than yours, when ye shall be brought with them before the throne of God.
			</p>
		</blockquote>
	</div>
</section>
<section id="one">
	<h2>One entity</h2>
	<p>
		The Book of Mormon makes it out like Jehovah, Jesus, and the Holy Spirit are the same entity in several places.
		For example, here, Jehovah is going to take up flesh and get crucified.
		But wasn&apos;t it supposed to be Jesus that took that job?
	</p>
	<div class="cited-quotation">
		<cite>2 Nephi 6:9</cite>
		<blockquote>
			<p>
				Nevertheless, the Lord has shown unto me that they should return again.
				And he also has shown unto me that the Lord God, the Holy One of Israel, should manifest himself unto them in the flesh; and after he should manifest himself they should scourge him and crucify him, according to the words of the angel who spake it unto me.
			</p>
		</blockquote>
	</div>
	<p>
		And here, the creator (Jehovah) is prophesied to show himself in the flesh in Jeruselum, then die for everyone.
		Again, that was Jesus.
	</p>
	<div class="cited-quotation">
		<cite>2 Nephi 9:4 - 9:5</cite>
		<blockquote>
			<p>
				For I know that ye have searched much, many of you, to know of things to come; wherefore I know that ye know that our flesh must waste away and die; nevertheless, in our bodies we shall see God.
			</p>
			<p>
				Yea, I know that ye know that in the body he shall show himself unto those at Jerusalem, from whence we came; for it is expedient that it should be among them; for it behooveth the great Creator that he suffereth himself to become subject unto man in the flesh, and die for all men, that all men might become subject unto him.
			</p>
		</blockquote>
	</div>
	<p>
		Here, the book talks about their god being crucified, and it seems like also their god being their Christ.
		Again, their god is Jehovah, not Jesus, but Jesus is the one that gets crucified later on.
	</p>
	<div class="cited-quotation">
		<cite>2 Nephi 10:3 - 10:7</cite>
		<blockquote>
			<p>
				Wherefore, as I said unto you, it must needs be expedient that Christ-for in the last night the angel spake unto me that this should be his name-should come among the Jews, among those who are the more wicked part of the world; and they shall crucify him-for thus it behooveth our God, and there is none other nation on earth that would crucify their God.
			</p>
			<p>
				For should the mighty miracles be wrought among other nations they would repent, and know that he be their God.
			</p>
			<p>
				But because of priestcrafts and iniquities, they at Jerusalem will stiffen their necks against him, that he be crucified.
			</p>
			<p>
				Wherefore, because of their iniquities, destructions, famines, pestilences, and bloodshed shall come upon them; and they who shall not be destroyed shall be scattered among all nations.
			</p>
			<p>
				But behold, thus saith the Lord God:
				When the day cometh that they shall believe in me, that I am Christ, then have I covenanted with their fathers that they shall be restored in the flesh, upon the earth, unto the lands of their inheritance.
			</p>
		</blockquote>
	</div>
	<p>
		Here, we start off with nonsense logic, saying that if there&apos;s no Christ there must not be a god at all, then we try to prove there&apos;s a god using our own existence somehow as evidence.
		After that, we go on though and claim that the Christ is our god, meaning Jehovah and Jesus would have to be the same person:
	</p>
	<div class="cited-quotation">
		<cite>2 Nephi 11:7</cite>
		<blockquote>
			<p>
				For if there be no Christ there be no God; and if there be no God we are not, for there could have been no creation.
				But there is a God, and he is Christ, and he cometh in the fulness of his own time.
			</p>
		</blockquote>
	</div>
	<p>
		Here, it&apos;s again stated that a child born will be the everlasting father:
	</p>
	<div class="cited-quotation">
		<cite>2 Nephi 19:6</cite>
		<blockquote>
			<p>
				For unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given; and the government shall be upon his shoulder; and his name shall be called, Wonderful, Counselor, The Mighty God, The Everlasting Father, The Prince of Peace.
			</p>
		</blockquote>
	</div>
	<p>
		And again, Jesus is stated to be the eternal god:
	</p>
	<div class="cited-quotation">
		<cite>2 Nephi 26:12</cite>
		<blockquote>
			<p>
				And as I spake concerning the convincing of the Jews, that Jesus is the very Christ, it must needs be that the Gentiles be convinced also that Jesus is the Christ, the Eternal God;
			</p>
		</blockquote>
	</div>
	<p>
		Finally, it&apos;s outright stated that these three are one god:
	</p>
	<div class="cited-quotation">
		<cite>2 Nephi 31:21</cite>
		<blockquote>
			<p>
				And now, behold, my beloved brethren, this is the way; and there is none other way nor name given under heaven whereby man can be saved in the kingdom of God.
				And now, behold, this is the doctrine of Christ, and the only and true doctrine of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost, which is one God, without end.
				Amen.
			</p>
		</blockquote>
	</div>
	<p>
		I talked to the missionaries about it, and they deny that these three are the same person.
		I think it makes more sense for them not to be; I mean, if they&apos;re the same entity, why do they get separate names?
		Still, it&apos;s an odd quirk in the book.
		It makes me think its author, Joseph Smith, did consider them to be the same entity.
	</p>
	<p>
		And check this out:
	</p>
	<div class="cited-quotation">
		<cite>Mosiah 3:5 3:10</cite>
		<blockquote>
			<p>
				For behold, the time cometh, and is not far distant, that with power, the Lord Omnipotent who reigneth, who was, and is from all eternity to all eternity, shall come down from heaven among the children of men, and shall dwell in a tabernacle of clay, and shall go forth amongst men, working mighty miracles, such as healing the sick, raising the dead, causing the lame to walk, the blind to receive their sight, and the deaf to hear, and curing all manner of diseases.
			</p>
			<p>
				And he shall cast out devils, or the evil spirits which dwell in the hearts of the children of men.
			</p>
			<p>
				And lo, he shall suffer temptations, and pain of body, hunger, thirst, and fatigue, even more than man can suffer, except it be unto death; for behold, blood cometh from every pore, so great shall be his anguish for the wickedness and the abominations of his people.
			</p>
			<p>
				And he shall be called Jesus Christ, the Son of God, the Father of heaven and earth, the Creator of all things from the beginning; and his mother shall be called Mary.
			</p>
			<p>
				And lo, he cometh unto his own, that salvation might come unto the children of men even through faith on his name; and even after all this they shall consider him a man, and say that he hath a devil, and shall scourge him, and shall crucify him.
			</p>
			<p>
				And he shall rise the third day from the dead; and behold, he standeth to judge the world; and behold, all these things are done that a righteous judgment might come upon the children of men.
			</p>
		</blockquote>
	</div>
	<p>
		Supposedly, this is about Jesus.
		However, if Jesus was created by someone, for example, if he were created by Elohim, that means he didn&apos;t exist from all eternity.
		He may exist <strong>*to*</strong> all eternity, but not <strong>*from*</strong>.
		It could be about Elohim, of course, but that would mean that Elohim was to come to earth and do all the things Jesus did, and was even named Jesus Christ.
		That would make Elohim and Jesus one and the same.
	</p>
</section>
<section id="versus">
	<h2>Us-versus-them mentality</h2>
	<p>
		There&apos;s a prevalent us versus them mentality in this book.
		Let&apos;s start with the division of people into churches.
		The Book of Mormon claims that there are only two churches, and everyone has to belong to one.
		That&apos;s right, if you believe nothing and follow no one, you&apos;re somehow a part of a church anyway: the devil&apos;s church:
	</p>
	<div class="cited-quotation">
		<cite>1 Nephi 14:10</cite>
		<blockquote>
			<p>
				And he said unto me:
				Behold there are save two churches only; the one is the church of the Lamb of God, and the other is the church of the devil; wherefore, whoso belongeth not to the church of the Lamb of God belongeth to that great church, which is the mother of abominations; and she is the whore of all the earth.
			</p>
		</blockquote>
	</div>
	<p>
		This next passage begins fine, saying if that if you fight against Zion, the holy city, you&apos;re against Jehovah.
		However, it continues to say that any who are not with Jehovah in general are against him.
		That&apos;s not how things work.
		You can&apos;t be against someone you believe to be fictitious.
		We atheists aren&apos;t against Jehovah.
		Furthermore, it&apos;s possible to take a neutral stand even on matters you believe to be real.
		You can believe in Jehovah while not agreeing or disagreeing with his ways.
		That said, his ways are pretty harsh, so it&apos;s hard not to be opposed to them if you&apos;re not actively on his side.
		Taking a neutral stand with this monster is rather difficult if you believe him to be real.
	</p>
	<div class="cited-quotation">
		<cite>2 Nephi 10:16</cite>
		<blockquote>
			<p>
				Wherefore, he that fighteth against Zion, both Jew and Gentile, both bond and free, both male and female, shall perish; for they are they who are the whore of all the earth; for they who are not for me are against me, saith our God.
			</p>
		</blockquote>
	</div>
	<p>
		Here, we see the claim made that if you&apos;re not a follower of Jehovah, you&apos;re in open rebellion against him.
		The only way to disobey what you&apos;re told Jehovah wants of you is to listen to an evil spirit (I assume this is Satan).
		You couldn&apos;t just, say, not believe what you&apos;re told Jehovah wants or even not believe in Jehovah at all
		The only possible way is that you&apos;re rebelling against him:
	</p>
	<div class="cited-quotation">
		<cite>Mosiah 2:36 - 2:37</cite>
		<blockquote>
			<p>
				And now, I say unto you, my brethren, that after ye have known and have been taught all these things, if ye should transgress and go contrary to that which has been spoken, that ye do withdraw yourselves from the Spirit of the Lord, that it may have no place in you to guide you in wisdom&apos;s paths that ye may be blessed, prospered, and preserved-
			</p>
			<p>
				I say unto you, that the man that doeth this, the same cometh out in open rebellion against God; therefore he listeth to obey the evil spirit, and becometh an enemy to all righteousness; therefore, the Lord has no place in him, for he dwelleth not in unholy temples.
			</p>
		</blockquote>
	</div>
</section>
<section id="purification">
	<h2>Purification</h2>
	<div class="cited-quotation">
		<cite>2 Nephi 16:6 - 16:7</cite>
		<blockquote>
			<p>
				Then flew one of the seraphim unto me, having a live coal in his hand, which he had taken with the tongs from off the altar;
			</p>
			<p>
				And he laid it upon my mouth, and said: Lo, this has touched thy lips; and thine iniquity is taken away, and thy sin purged.
			</p>
		</blockquote>
	</div>
	<p>
		Apparently, one&apos;s sins can be purged by seraphim using hot coals.
		If this is the case, why isn&apos;t everyone&apos;s sins being purged this way?
		Wouldn&apos;t that fix everyone to be as Jehovah wants them to be?
		And if that&apos;s somehow not okay, why is it fine to purge this one person&apos;s sin?
		Why do they get the special treatment?
	</p>
</section>
<section id="diet">
	<h2>Effects of diet on morality</h2>
	<p>
		Apparently, one&apos;s diet can effect one&apos;s morality quite immensely:
	</p>
	<div class="cited-quotation">
		<cite>2 Nephi 17:15 - 17:16</cite>
		<blockquote>
			<p>
				Therefore, the Lord himself shall give you a sign-Behold, a virgin shall conceive, and shall bear a son, and shall call his name Immanuel.
			</p>
			<p>
				Butter and honey shall he eat, that he may know to refuse the evil and to choose the good.
			</p>
		</blockquote>
	</div>
	<p>
		So ... a diet of butter and honey is supposed to make you know right from wrong?
		That doesn&apos;t seem right.
		It also doesn&apos;t sound like a healthy diet.
	</p>
	<p>
		I do understand diet affects personality.
		Believe me.
		When I stopped eating animal products, I noticed I became a softer person.
		For example, I started caring more when I&apos;d trod on plants, for example, or accidentally broke branches.
		But it wasn&apos;t something as drastic as knowing right from wrong.
		Eating butter and honey doesn&apos;t have the magical effect of granting morality.
		No diet does.
	</p>
	<p>
		Later, this strange diet is mentioned again:
	</p>
	<div class="cited-quotation">
		<cite>2 Nephi 27:40</cite>
		<blockquote>
			<p>
				And it shall come to pass, for the abundance of milk they shall give he shall eat butter; for butter and honey shall every one eat that is left in the land.
			</p>
		</blockquote>
	</div>
	<p>
		Maybe the implication is that these people too will gain a moral compass through this bizarre diet that will no doubt leave them malnourished?
	</p>
</section>
<section id="signs">
	<h2>Signs</h2>
	<p>
		Many of us ask for a sign that Jehovah or any other god exists.
		But check this out:
	</p>
	<div class="cited-quotation">
		<cite>2 Nephi 17:10</cite>
		<blockquote>
			<p>
				Moreover, the Lord spake again unto Ahaz, saying:
			</p>
			<p>
				Ask thee a sign of the Lord thy God; ask it either in the depths, or in the heights above.
			</p>
			<p>
				But Ahaz said: I will not ask, neither will I tempt the Lord.
			</p>
			<p>
				And he said: Hear ye now, O house of David; is it a small thing for you to weary men, but will ye weary my God also?
			</p>
			<p>
				Therefore, the Lord himself shall give you a sign-Behold, a virgin shall conceive, and shall bear a son, and shall call his name Immanuel.
			</p>
		</blockquote>
	</div>
	<p>
		Jehovah tells Ahaz to ask him for a sign so he can prove he&apos;s really the lord, his god.
		Ahaz says he doesn&apos;t need a sign, and from the sounds of it, it&apos;s because he already believes and doesn&apos;t want to risk looking at all like he doesn&apos;t.
		So what does Jehovah do?
		He crams a sign down Ahaz&apos;s throat!
		So if you want a sign so you have reason to believe, too bad, you can&apos;t have one.
		In fact, the entire religion is based on the premise that you just have to believe without any evidence whatsoever.
		But if you don&apos;t want a sign, too bad, you get one anyway.
	</p>
</section>
<section id="ghost">
	<h2>Holy Ghost</h2>
	<p>
		The Mormons teach that you have to listen to the Holy Ghost, who speaks through vague feelings and emptions, instead of anything actually identifiable as being a divine source.
		The missionaries told me I should pray about whether I should get baptised on a specific date, then just go with my feelings on the matter, as that&apos;d be a message from the Holy Ghost.
		They failed to mention the baptism would officially make me a member of the church, meaning that if they failed to convince me after this had happened, I&apos;d technically be an apostate because I&apos;d&apos;ve left the church.
		But check out what their holy book says on the matter:
	</p>
	<div class="cited-quotation">
		<cite>2 Nephi 31:12 - 31:14</cite>
		<blockquote>
			<p>
				And also, the voice of the Son came unto me, saying:
				He that is baptized in my name, to him will the Father give the Holy Ghost, like unto me; wherefore, follow me, and do the things which ye have seen me do.
			</p>
			<p>
				Wherefore, my beloved brethren, I know that if ye shall follow the Son, with full purpose of heart, acting no hypocrisy and no deception before God, but with real intent, repenting of your sins, witnessing unto the Father that ye are willing to take upon you the name of Christ, by baptism-yea, by following your Lord and your Savior down into the water, according to his word, behold, then shall ye receive the Holy Ghost; yea, then cometh the baptism of fire and of the Holy Ghost; and then can ye speak with the tongue of angels, and shout praises unto the Holy One of Israel.
			</p>
			<p>
				But, behold, my beloved brethren, thus came the voice of the Son unto me, saying:
				After ye have repented of your sins, and witnessed unto the Father that ye are willing to keep my commandments, by the baptism of water, and have received the baptism of fire and of the Holy Ghost, and can speak with a new tongue, yea, even with the tongue of angels, and after this should deny me, it would have been better for you that ye had not known me.
			</p>
		</blockquote>
	</div>
	<p>
		In other words, no prayer uttered before the baptism is actually good for anything, according to their scriptures.
		No answer will ever come.
		Also, do you have a conscience and basic intuition but you&apos;ve never been baptised?
		Well, that&apos;s not the Holy Ghost then.
		So having the Holy Ghost&apos;s help is about the same as <strong>*not*</strong> having the Holy Ghost&apos;s help.
		It doesn&apos;t sound like the Holy Ghost actually exists.
		Also, for good measure, they worked in a part about it being bad to be an apostate, there at the end.
	</p>
	<p>
		I talked to the missionaries about this, and they clarified a bit.
		After baptism, you receive the &quot;gift of the Holy Ghost&quot;, at which point the Holy Ghost is with you all the time.
		However, before that, the Holy Ghost can come and go as it pleases.
		You&apos;re able to receive answers to prayers at that point, but you won&apos;t have it&apos;s continual guidance.
		So I guess before baptism, your conscience and intuition are your own most of the time, but afterwards, it&apos;s all attributed to the Holy Spirit.
	</p>
</section>
<section id="poligamy">
	<h2>Poligamy</h2>
	<p>
		The Mormon church supports one male, many female poligamy (poligyny).
		In the recent past, they&apos;ve had to <a href="https://www.mormonnewsroom.org/topic/polygamy">publicly retract this support</a>, but to the best of my knowledge, it&apos;s still present within the actual beliefs and customs of the church.
		For example, if a male and female get sealed (in marriage) in the temple, they become bound forever, unless the male decides to let the female out of the sealing.
		The female is then unable to become sealed to someone else.
		However, the male can be sealed with another female, and in heaven, he supposedly will have both females as wives.
		Compare this with what their holy book has said, right from the beginning of the religion:
	</p>
	<div class="cited-quotation">
		<cite>Jacob 2:23 - 2:28</cite>
		<blockquote>
			<p>
				But the word of God burdens me because of your grosser crimes.
				For behold, thus saith the Lord:
				This people begin to wax in iniquity; they understand not the scriptures, for they seek to excuse themselves in committing whoredoms, because of the things which were written concerning David, and Solomon his son.
			</p>
			<p>
				Behold, David and Solomon truly had many wives and concubines, which thing was abominable before me, saith the Lord.
			</p>
			<p>
				Wherefore, thus saith the Lord, I have led this people forth out of the land of Jerusalem, by the power of mine arm, that I might raise up unto me a righteous branch from the fruit of the loins of Joseph.
			</p>
			<p>
				Wherefore, I the Lord God will not suffer that this people shall do like unto them of old.
			</p>
			<p>
				Wherefore, my brethren, hear me, and hearken to the word of the Lord:
				For there shall not any man among you have save it be one wife; and concubines he shall have none;
			</p>
			<p>
				For I, the Lord God, delight in the chastity of women. And whoredoms are an abomination before me; thus saith the Lord of Hosts.
			</p>
		</blockquote>
	</div>
	<p>
		First of all, Jehovah delights in the chastity of women?
		But not men?
		That&apos;s sexist!
		But also, this isn&apos;t an issue of the chastity of women.
		The women are taking one man in this scenario.
		It&apos;s the chastity of the <strong>*men*</strong> that&apos;s an issue, when you&apos;ve got one man with many women.
	</p>
	<p>
		Later, we see the Lamanites brought up, who are praised for following the rule of monogamy, unlike the Nephites:
	</p>
	<div class="cited-quotation">
		<cite>Jacob 3:5 - 3:6</cite>
		<blockquote>
			<p>
				Behold, the Lamanites your brethren, whom ye hate because of their filthiness and the cursing which hath come upon their skins, are more righteous than you; for they have not forgotten the commandment of the Lord, which was given unto our father-that they should have save it were one wife, and concubines they should have none, and there should not be whoredoms committed among them.
			</p>
			<p>
				And now, this commandment they observe to keep; wherefore, because of this observance, in keeping this commandment, the Lord God will not destroy them, but will be merciful unto them; and one day they shall become a blessed people.
			</p>
		</blockquote>
	</div>
</section>
<section id="limitations">
	<h2>Limitations of Jehovah</h2>
	<p>
		Jehovah is said to be all-powerful, but he&apos;s actually not.
		He has certain limitations on his power.
		For example, he cannot lie for some reason.
		It&apos;s not that he chooses not to because he&apos;s opposed to the concept of lying, it&apos;s that he actually cannot lie for some reason.
	</p>
	<div class="cited-quotation">
		<cite>Enos 6</cite>
		<blockquote>
			<p>
				And I, Enos, knew that God could not lie; wherefore, my guilt was swept away.
			</p>
		</blockquote>
	</div>
</section>
<section id="anything">
	<h2>Ask for anything you want</h2>
	<p>
		Either Jehovah gave Enos special privileges, or anyone that asks Jehovah for anything at all will receive it, as long as they believe hard enough:
	</p>
	<div class="cited-quotation">
		<cite>Enos 15</cite>
		<blockquote>
			<p>
				Wherefore, I knowing that the Lord God was able to preserve our records, I cried unto him continually, for he had said unto me:
				Whatsoever thing ye shall ask in faith, believing that ye shall receive in the name of Christ, ye shall receive it.
			</p>
		</blockquote>
	</div>
</section>
<section id="life">
	<h2>Debt for life</h2>
	<div class="cited-quotation">
		<cite>Mosiah 2:23 - 2:24</cite>
		<blockquote>
			<p>
				And now, in the first place, he hath created you, and granted unto you your lives, for which ye are indebted unto him.
			</p>
			<p>
				And secondly, he doth require that ye should do as he hath commanded you; for which if ye do, he doth immediately bless you; and therefore he hath paid you.
				And ye are still indebted unto him, and are, and will be, forever and ever; therefore, of what have ye to boast?
			</p>
		</blockquote>
	</div>
	<p>
		Supposedly, we owe Jehovah because he created us.
		We never asked to be created though; we couldn&apos;t until after our creation.
		He didn&apos;t create us for our good, but because he wanted us.
		I&apos;m not even convinced that our lives are a gift rather than a curse.
		The kindest thing one can do for someone is not create them.
		Please, do your offspring a favour and never have any children.
	</p>
	<p>
		The next verse gets even worse though.
		You try to repay him for creating you, but he just keeps giving you more whenever you do, and you owe him for that as well.
		Supposedly, you live on in heaven an eternity too, which means that you spend an eternity in debt.
		That&apos;s horrible.
	</p>
	<div class="cited-quotation">
		<cite>Mosiah 2:34</cite>
		<blockquote>
			<p>
				I say unto you, that there are not any among you, except it be your little children that have not been taught concerning these things, but what knoweth that ye are eternally indebted to your heavenly Father, to render to him all that you have and are; and also have been taught concerning the records which contain the prophecies which have been spoken by the holy prophets, even down to the time our father, Lehi, left Jerusalem;
			</p>
		</blockquote>
	</div>
	<p>
		Again, while this passage doesn&apos;t outright say he owns you, it makes it pretty clear that he owns you because you own yourself to him forever.
	</p>
</section>

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